Ted英语演讲：如何和退伍军人探讨战争——Wes Moore
Wes Moore在Ted英语演讲：如何和退伍军人探讨战争，一个退伍军人讲述了自己如何成为军人等经历。
Wes Moore在Ted英语演讲：如何和退伍军人探讨战争(中英双语+MP3下载)
I’m excited to be here to speak about vets, because I didn’t join the Army because I wanted to go to war. I didn’t join the Army because I had a lust or a need to go overseas and fight. Frankly, I joined the Army because college is really damn expensive, and they were going to help with that, and I joined the Army because it was what I knew, and it was what I knew that I thought I could do well.
很兴奋能来这里谈退伍军人， 因为我没有为了想上战场而从军。 我从军不是因为我渴望 或需要出国打仗。 坦白说，我从军是因为 念大学贵得要命， 他们想帮我； 我从军是因为 我当时只知道这条路， 我当时认为我能做得很好。
I didn’t come from a military family. I’m not a military brat. No one in my family ever had joined the military at all, and how I first got introduced to the military was when I was 13 years old and I got sent away to military school, because my mother had been threatening me with this idea of military school ever since I was eight years old.
我并非来自军人家庭。 我不是军人子弟。 我们家族根本没人从军过， 我首次和军方接触 是在 13 岁的时候， 我被送到军校， 因为我妈从我八岁就开始 就威胁要送我去念军校。
I had some issues when I was coming up, and my mother would always tell me, she’s like, “You know, if you don’t get this together, I’m going to send you to military school.” And I’d look at her, and I’d say, “Mommy, I’ll work harder.” And then when I was nine years old, she started giving me brochures to show me she wasn’t playing around, so I’d look at the brochures, and I’m like, “Okay, Mommy, I can see you’re serious, and I’ll work harder.” And then when I was 10 and 11, my behavior just kept on getting worse. I was on academic and disciplinary probation before I hit double digits, and I first felt handcuffs on my wrists when I was 11 years old. And so when I was 13 years old, my mother came up to me, and she was like, “I’m not going to do this anymore. I’m going to send you to military school.” And I looked at her, and I said, “Mommy, I can see you’re upset, and I’m going to work harder.” And she was like, “No, you’re going next week.” And that was how I first got introduced to this whole idea of the military, because she thought this was a good idea.
我长大期间有些状况， 我妈老是说： 「如果你不振作起来， 我就送你去念军校。」 我会看着她，然后说： 「妈咪，我会更努力。」 到我九岁时， 她开始给我一些小册子，让我知道她是来真的， 我会看着小册子说： 「妈咪，我知道你是认真的，我会更努力一点。」 然后在我 10 到 11 岁时， 我的行为变得更偏差。 我被留校查看的时候 还没满 10 岁； 我的手腕第一次被上手铐 是在 11 岁的时候。 到了 13 岁， 我妈跟我说： 「我不干了。 我要送你去军校。」 我看着她说： 「妈咪，我看得出来你很难过，我会更努力。」 她说：「不，你下星期就得去。」 那是我第一次 接触和军方有关的事， 因为她觉得这是个好主意。
I had to disagree with her wholeheartedly when I first showed up there, because literally in the first four days, I had already run away five times from this school. They had these big black gates that surrounded the school, and every time they would turn their backs, I would just simply run out of the black gates and take them up on their offer that if we don’t want to be there, we can leave at any time. So I just said, “Well, if that’s the case, then I’d like to leave.” (Laughter) And it never worked. And I kept on getting lost.
刚进去时，我打从心底认为她的想法大错特错， 因为基本上，在头四天 我就已经逃学五次了。 那里有些黑色大门环绕校园， 每次他们都会转身， 我只要从那黑色大门跑出去， 如果我们不想待在那，只要抓紧机会， 随时都能离开。 因此我想：「好吧，如果是那样的话， 那我就会离开。」（笑声） 结果从没成功。 我一直迷路。
But then eventually, after staying there for a little while, and after the end of that first year at this military school, I realized that I actually was growing up. I realized the things that I enjoyed about this school and the thing that I enjoyed about the structure was something that I’d never found before: the fact that I finally felt like I was part of something bigger, part of a team, and it actually mattered to people that I was there, the fact that leadership wasn’t just a punchline there, but that it was a real, actually core part of the entire experience. And so when it was time for me to actually finish up high school, I started thinking about what I wanted to do, and just like probably most students, had no idea what that meant or what I wanted to do. And I thought about the people who I respected and admired. I thought about a lot of the people, in particular a lot of the men, in my life who I looked up to. They all happened to wear the uniform of the United States of America, so for me, the question and the answer really became pretty easy. The question of what I wanted to do was filled in very quickly with saying, I guess I’ll be an Army officer.
终于，我在那待了一阵子， 在这间军校待满一整年后， 我发现自己真的长大了。 我发现自己待在这间学校很愉快， 而喜欢这地方 是我从未察觉的事： 我终于感到自己归属于某个更大的地方， 属于一个团队，其实和我同在的人们有关， 事实上在那里领导不只是美好的结局， 而是一种真实的事， 其实是整个经验的核心， 因此当我高中快毕业的时候， 我开始思考自己想做什么， 就像大部分的学生一样， 我没什么想法，也不知道要做什么。 我想了想自己尊敬和钦佩的对象。 我想了很多人， 尤其是许多我在生活中景仰的对象。 他们刚好都穿代表美国的制服， 因此对我来说，问题的答案变得显而易见。 我想做什么的问题 很快就有了答案， 我想当军官。
So the Army then went through this process and they trained me up, and when I say I didn’t join the Army because I wanted to go to war, the truth is, I joined in 1996. There really wasn’t a whole lot going on. I didn’t ever feel like I was in danger. When I went to my mom, I first joined the Army when I was 17 years old, so I literally needed parental permission to join the Army, so I kind of gave the paperwork to my mom, and she just assumed it was kind of like military school. She was like, “Well, it was good for him before, so I guess I’ll just let him keep doing it,” having no idea that the paperwork that she was signing was actually signing her son up to become an Army officer. And I went through the process, and again the whole time still just thinking, this is great, maybe I’ll serve on a weekend, or two weeks during the year, do drill, and then a couple years after I signed up, a couple years after my mother signed those papers, the whole world changed. And after 9/11, there was an entirely new context about the occupation that I chose. When I first joined, I never joined to fight, but now that I was in, this is exactly what was now going to happen.
因此军队开始让我受训， 我说我没有因为想上战场而从军， 其实我在 1996 年时从军了。 其实当时也没多少战争， 我从不觉得自己身在险境。 我 17 岁第一次从军时去找了我妈， 基本上我需要家长同意才能从军， 所以我把文件交给我妈， 然后她只是把那看做是军校数据。 她说：「这以前还蛮管用的， 就让他继续下去吧。」 她完全没概念自己要签的文件 其实是让她儿子 成为一名军官。 我完成手续后， 只是一心想着， 这太棒了，也许我会在周末服役， 或是一整年操练两周。 然而在我登记入伍几年后， 在我妈签署那些文件几年后， 世界完全变了。 在 911 之后，我所选择的职业 已有全然不同的环境背景。 我首次入伍时，从没打算要上战场， 但当我入伍后， 那是无可避免的事。
And I thought about so much about the soldiers who I eventually had to end up leading. I remember when we first, right after 9/11, three weeks after 9/11, I was on a plane heading overseas, but I wasn’t heading overseas with the military, I was heading overseas because I got a scholarship to go overseas. I received the scholarship to go overseas and to go study and live overseas, and I was living in England and that was interesting, but at the same time, the same people who I was training with, the same soldiers that I went through all my training with, and we prepared for war, they were now actually heading over to it. They were now about to find themselves in the middle of places the fact is the vast majority of people, the vast majority of us as we were training, couldn’t even point out on a map. I spent a couple years finishing graduate school, and the whole entire time while I’m sitting there in buildings at Oxford that were literally built hundreds of years before the United States was even founded, and I’m sitting there talking to dons about the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand, and how that influenced the start of World War I, where the entire time my heart and my head were on my soldiers who were now throwing on Kevlars and grabbing their flak vests and figuring out how exactly do I change around or how exactly do I clean a machine gun in the darkness. That was the new reality.
我想了很多 关于自己未来得要带领的士兵。 我记得第一次，就在 911 之后， 911 的三周后，我在飞机上正要出国， 但我不是和军队一起出国， 我是因为拿到了奖学金才要出国。 我拿到奖学金出国， 准备要在国外念书和居住， 我当时住在英国，那里很有趣， 但同时， 和我一起受训的人， 和我一起受训的所有士兵， 我们原本都准备上战场， 他们其实正在路上。 他们会发现自己正在 前往某个地方的半路上， 其实大部分的人， 我们大部分接受训练的人 都无法指出要去地图上的哪个地方。 我花了几年念完研究所， 这段期间， 我坐在牛津大学的教室里， 基本上这些建筑都是数百年前建造， 甚至比美国建立还早， 我坐在那里和师长讨论 法兰兹．费迪南德大公被刺杀的事， 以及这件事如何引发第一次世界大战， 我在那里的所有时间， 心思都在士兵身上， 他们匆忙穿上克维拉防弹装备， 抓着防弹背心， 然后确认我转换的确切位置， 或是我如何在黑暗之中 清理枪械。 那是新的现实。
By the time I finished that up and I rejoined my military unit and we were getting ready to deploy to Afghanistan, there were soldiers in my unit who were now on their second and third deployments before I even had my first. I remember walking out with my unit for the first time, and when you join the Army and you go through a combat tour, everyone looks at your shoulder, because on your shoulder is your combat patch. And so immediately as you meet people, you shake their hand, and then your eyes go to their shoulder, because you want to see where did they serve, or what unit did they serve with? And I was the only person walking around with a bare shoulder, and it burned every time someone stared at it.
到我完成学业、回到军队时， 我们已准备好部署前进阿富汗， 在我单位上的士兵 现正进行第二、三次的部署， 我连一次都还没去过。 我记得首次和组员走出去时， 当你从军后， 你参与一场战役， 每个人都会看你的肩膀， 因为你肩上有队徽。 因此，只要你和人见面， 你和他们握手， 那么你的眼睛就会落到他们肩上， 因为你想看他们在哪服役， 或是他们属于哪个单位？ 我是唯一肩上空无一物的人。 每次有人盯着看，我都觉得很尴尬。
But you get a chance to talk to your soldiers, and you ask them why did they sign up. I signed up because college was expensive. A lot of my soldiers signed up for completely different reasons. They signed up because of a sense of obligation. They signed up because they were angry and they wanted to do something about it. They signed up because their family said this was important. They signed up because they wanted some form of revenge. They signed for a whole collection of different reasons. And now we all found ourselves overseas fighting in these conflicts.
但是你有机会和你的士兵对话， 你问他们为什么要从军。 我从军是因为大学学费很贵。 许多士兵从军是出于完全不同的原因。 他们从军，是因为一种责任感。 他们从军，是因为他们很生气， 他们想要做点什么。 他们从军，是因为 他们的家人说这很重要。 他们从军，是因为他们想要报仇。 他们从军是出于各式各样的原因。 而现在，我们都发现自己都在国外 打这些仗。
And what was amazing to me was that I very naively started hearing this statement that I never fully understood, because right after 9/11, you start hearing this idea where people come up to you and they say, “Well, thank you for your service.” And I just kind of followed in and started saying the same things to all my soldiers. This is even before I deployed. But I really had no idea what that even meant. I just said it because it sounded right. I said it because it sounded like the right thing to say to people who had served overseas. “Thank you for your service.” But I had no idea what the context was or what that even, what it even meant to the people who heard it.
让我惊讶的是， 我开始天真地听进这种言论， 我从未完全了解的言论， 因为在 911 之后， 你会开始碰到有人过来对你说： 「谢谢你的服务。」 之后我做一样的事， 开始对我的士兵说同样的话。 这件事甚至在我被派上战场前。 但我其实不懂那是什么意思。 我只是照着说，因为听起来没错。 我说是因为那听起来 像该对曾在海外服役者说的话。 「谢谢你的服务。」 但是我对这话的内容没概念， 甚至， 甚至对那些听到的人来说是什么意思都不知道。
When I first came back from Afghanistan, I thought that if you make it back from conflict, then the dangers were all over. I thought that if you made it back from a conflict zone that somehow you could kind of wipe the sweat off your brow and say, “Whew, I’m glad I dodged that one,” without understanding that for so many people, as they come back home, the war keeps going. It keeps playing out in all of our minds. It plays out in all of our memories. It plays out in all of our emotions. Please forgive us if we don’t like being in big crowds. Please forgive us when we spend one week in a place that has 100 percent light discipline, because you’re not allowed to walk around with white lights, because if anything has a white light, it can be seen from miles away, versus if you use little green or little blue lights, they cannot be seen from far away. So please forgive us if out of nowhere, we go from having 100 percent light discipline to then a week later being back in the middle of Times Square, and we have a difficult time adjusting to that. Please forgive us when you transition back to a family who has completely been maneuvering without you, and now when you come back, it’s not that easy to fall back into a sense of normality, because the whole normal has changed.
当我第一次从阿富汗回来， 我想如果你从战场上顺利回来， 那所有的危险就都结束了。 我想如果你成功从战区回来， 你多少有资格可以擦掉额头上的汗水说： 「呼，真高兴我逃过一劫。」 却没想到对许多人来说， 他们回了家， 战争还是持续进行。 战争在我们的心里仍继续上演。 战争在我们的记忆中仍继续上演。 战争在我们的情绪中上演。 请原谅我们， 若是我们不想待在大批人潮里。 请原谅我们， 如果我们花了一个星期 待在有灯光管制的地方， 那是因为你不准走在白光底下， 因为如果有白光， 在几哩外就能被看见， 相较之下如果你用小绿灯， 或是小蓝灯， 在远处就不会被看见。 因此请原谅我们，如果突然间， 我们从一个到处有灯光管制的地方， 一个星期后回到时代广场中央， 我们会很难适应。 请原谅我们， 当你回到家里， 这个家的运作已经完全习惯没有你， 而当你现在回来了， 要回到正常的感觉不太容易， 因为正常的意义早已完全改变。
I remember when I came back, I wanted to talk to people. I wanted people to ask me about my experiences. I wanted people to come up to me and tell me, “What did you do?” I wanted people to come up to me and tell me, “What was it like? What was the food like? What was the experience like? How are you doing?” And the only questions I got from people was, “Did you shoot anybody?” And those were the ones who were even curious enough to say anything. Because sometimes there’s this fear and there’s this apprehension that if I say anything, I’m afraid I’ll offend, or I’m afraid I’ll trigger something, so the common default is just saying nothing. The problem with that is then it feels like your service was not even acknowledged, like no one even cared. “Thank you for your service,” and we move on. What I wanted to better understand was what’s behind that, and why “thank you for your service” isn’t enough. The fact is, we have literally 2.6 million men and women who are veterans of Iraq or Afghanistan who are all amongst us. Sometimes we know who they are, sometimes we don’t, but there is that feeling, the shared experience, the shared bond where we know that that experience and that chapter of our life, while it might be closed, it’s still not over.
我记得当我回来时，我想找人说话。 我希望有人问问我的经历。 我希望有人来问我： 「你是做什么的？」 我希望有人来问我： 「那是什么样子？食物尝起来如何？ 那经历是什么样子？你还好吗？」 然而我唯一被问到的是： 「你有枪杀任何人吗？」 那些人好奇到什么都会说。 因为有时候会有种恐惧和担心， 在我说了之后， 我怕我会冒犯， 或是我怕我会引发什么， 所以通常就只会什么都不说。 问题是 那感觉就像是你的服务 甚至不值得被表彰， 就像根本没有人在乎一样。 「谢谢你的服务」， 然后我们就继续过日子。 我想更了解的是 在那背后的东西， 还有为什么「谢谢你的服务」并不足够。 事实上， 我们其实有 260 万名男女 是伊拉克或阿富汗回来的退伍军人， 他们就身在我们之中。 有时候我们知道他们是谁， 有时不然， 但是有种感觉，就是在共有的经历 和共有的关系之中， 我们知道那种经历 以及我们生命中的那个篇章 也许已经停止了， 但尚未结束。
We think about “thank you for your service,” and people say, “So what does ‘thank you for your service’ mean to you?” Well, “Thank you for your service” means to me, it means acknowledging our stories, asking us who we are, understanding the strength that so many people, so many people who we serve with, have, and why that service means so much. “Thank you for your service” means acknowledging the fact that just because we’ve now come home and we’ve taken off the uniform does not mean our larger service to this country is somehow over. The fact is, there’s still a tremendous amount that can be offered and can be given. When I look at people like our friend Taylor Urruela, who in Iraq loses his leg, had two big dreams in his life. One was to be a soldier. The other was to be a baseball player. He loses his leg in Iraq. He comes back and instead of deciding that, well, now since I’ve lost my leg, that second dream is over, he decides that he still has that dream of playing baseball, and he starts this group called VETSports, which now works with veterans all over the country and uses sports as a way of healing. People like Tammy Duckworth, who was a helicopter pilot and with the helicopter that she was flying, you need to use both your hands and also your legs to steer, and her helicopter gets hit, and she’s trying to steer the chopper, but the chopper’s not reacting to her instructions and to her commands. She’s trying to land the chopper safely, but the chopper doesn’t land safely, and the reason it’s not landing safely is because it’s not responding to the commands that her legs are giving because her legs were blown off. She barely survives. Medics come and they save her life, but then as she’s doing her recuperation back at home, she realizes that, “My job’s still not done.” And now she uses her voice as a Congresswoman from Illinois to fight and advocate for a collection of issues to include veterans issues.
我们思考「谢谢你的服务」， 人们会说：「『谢谢你的服务』对你有什么意义？」 「谢谢你的服务」对我而言有意义， 那代表承认我们的故事， 问问我们是谁， 了解和我们一起服务的人 拥有多强大的力量， 以及为什么这服务如此重要。 「谢谢你的服务」代表了承认这件事， 只因为我们现在回来了， 我们脱下了制服， 不代表我们对国家更大的服务 已就此结束。 事实上，还有无数 能够奉献与帮忙的事。 当我看着人们， 像是我们的朋友泰勒．乌鲁埃拉， 他在伊拉克失去了一只脚， 他在生命中曾有两个最大的梦想。 一个是当军人，另一项是当棒球员。 他在伊拉克失去了脚。 回来后， 他没有想 既然我失去了脚，第二个梦想也没了， 相反地，他还是有打棒球的梦想， 他设立了退伍军人运动协会， 目前在全国各地服务退伍军人， 将运动做为一种治疗的方式。 像谭美．达克沃斯这样的人， 她曾是直升机驾驶， 她操作的直升机 需要运用双手和双脚来驾驶， 但是她的直升机被袭击， 她试着驾驶直升机， 但是直升机没有反应， 她的指令和操作无效。 她试着安全降落直升机， 但是直升机却降落失败， 会降落失败的原因 不是因为直升机对她双脚的指令没有响应， 而是因为她的双脚被炸掉了。 她勉强活下来了。 军医赶来，救了她一命， 但她后来在家复健时， 她想：「我的工作还没结束。」 现在，她运用她的声音， 担任伊利诺伊州的国会众议员， 为许多议题而战斗与倡议， 其中包含许多退伍军人的议题。
We signed up because we love this country we represent. We signed up because we believe in the idea and we believe in the people to our left and to our right. And the only thing we then ask is that “thank you for your service” needs to be more than just a quote break, that “thank you for your service” means honestly digging in to the people who have stepped up simply because they were asked to, and what that means for us not just now, not just during combat operations, but long after the last vehicle has left and after the last shot has been taken.
我们从军是因为 我们爱自己代表的国家。 我们从军是因为 我们相信这个理念， 以及在我们左右的人。 而我们要求的只是 「谢谢你的服务」 不该只是一句标语， 「谢谢你的服务」代表了 真诚地服务上门的客人， 只因为这些人提出要求， 而那对我们的意义不只是现在， 不只是在作战的期间， 而是在离开最后一台车之后， 在开了最后一枪之后。
These are the people who I served with, and these are the people who I honor. So thank you for your service.
这些是和我一起服务的伙伴， 这些是我景仰的对象。 谢谢你的服务。
(Applause)
（掌声）